SUSTAINABLE FUTURE FOR THE WORLD HERITAGE CITIES OF MACARONESIA

General objective of the project

To take advantage of the added value of cooperation between the 5 World Heritage cities of Macaronesia, to create a Euro-African Network and develop a programme of actions that promote a more competitive Cooperation Area.

Development of a local economy based on knowledge and innovation

Creation of the Euro-African Network of World Heritage Cities in support of the objectives of the EU 2020 Strategy and UN 2030 – City 2020 Network:

• A launch meeting of the partner cities will be held with the objective of establishing a collaboration agreement where the objectives, obligations and conditions of cooperation between the cities are defined, identifying the common problems and proposing solutions to them. The main actions to be carried out by this NETWORK in the next three years will be defined, emphasizing a concrete and important priority for each and every city: the improvement of the business and commercial competitiveness of the same. There will be two annual meetings between the members of the NETWORK and an annual seminar to exchange experiences and good practices, where members of the UNESCO Governing Council and members of other networks of cities will be invited, such as the Spanish Network of World Heritage Cities.

Plan to improve smart, innovative and quality tourism products and services:

• Tourism companies have the opportunity to transform the way they offer services to tourists thanks to Big Data. To this end, tourism companies will be supported to strengthen the use of Big Data by: 1) conducting a comparative study of the tourism sector of the cities of the NETWORK through BIG DATA technology. 2) Local work sessions with the main public agents and private companies involved in the tourism sector, in order to interpret and draw conclusions from the data obtained in the Study and apply them to improve the products and services being offered. 3) Euro-African Seminar to present conclusions, recommendations and application of the results of the study to the intelligent optimization of the tourist management of the cities that make up the CITY 2020 Network.

Innovative programme of commercial revitalization to convert cities into commercial capital of its territory:

• The Network aims to favour conditions and generate opportunities for commercial activity and visitor attraction for the support of local economies. With this purpose, a day-night fair will be held in each and every city of the CITY 2020 Network, in which local businesses will participate. Companies from the cities belonging to the NETWORK will also be invited, thus promoting the knowledge thereof and inspiring them for their internationalization. Activities will be programmed around four areas: Culture, Heritage, Leisure and Commerce. The activities range from the celebration of concerts of music, dance, exhibitions and cultural activities of the Network of cities. There will be an exhibition of commercial stands of companies from all the cities of the NETWORK. Local businesses will remain open until dawn to take advantage of the flow of visitors, as well as the opportunity to contribute to the promotion of the city as a commercial capital.

Promotion of a local economy which makes more efficient use of resources, is greener and more competitive

Programme to improve quality and energy efficiency of resources for tourism management

• In order to achieve sustainable tourism that creates jobs and promotes local culture and products, and in order to promote a joint image and financially capitalize the distinction of UNESCO, it is important 1) to improve tourist signage. 2) improve tourism offices. Tourist signage is a resource that serves to encourage the mobility of visitors and, therefore, commercial activity. For this reason, the cities of the NETWORK will be provided with adequate signalling that is standardized and homogenized, installing new ones and replacing those that are deteriorated. Tourism offices are the starting point of the commercial activity. Therefore, an energy rehabilitation study will be carried out in order to provide them with: solar panels, home automation systems, interactive led displays in multi-languages ​​that offer information on local businesses in the municipalities.

Programme to support hotel companies and SMEs to boost energy efficiency and be more competitive.

• The programme is developed in three phases: 1) Diagnosis: a diagnosis of energy consumption of the hotel company and SMEs will be made. 2) Report of measures: A report of measures to be developed to improve energy efficiency will be delivered to the company. 3) Evaluation: The evaluation of the energy efficiency will be carried out once the measures have been applied. To this end, a seminar will be held to raise awareness about the importance of being energy efficient by inviting hotel companies and SMEs to participate in the programme. At the end of the programme, a seminar will be held to present results and exchange good practices among the companies participating in the program. Finally, a publication of a study will be prepared, gathering the experiences of the programme, which will help companies improve their business competitiveness through energy efficiency.

Improvement of the business environment by supporting the structuring of open commercial areas within the African cities of the Network

• Support will be given to the island of Gorée, Saint Louis and Cidade Velha to improve their respective business environments by structuring pedestrian shopping areas and, in doing so, giving a competitive advantage to the companies that are in them. Emphasis will be placed on establishing standardized and homogeneous criteria, taking advantage of the common distinction of being world heritage cities. For this, a Sustainable Urban Mobility Study (SUMS) will be carried out with the specific objective of pedestrianizing certain areas for the promotion of commerce in the city, the selection of measures to achieve it, the definition of monitoring indicators and scenarios to compare with the base scenario. Forums will be held in each of the cities where the SUMS draft is presented. Citizens will participate so their requests can be collected and incorporated into the definite SUMS.

Promotion of a local economy with a high level of employment, with social and territorial cohesion

Integration strategy of the historical centre with the municipal territory, eliminating the existing economic inequality between both areas.

• One of the great problems of the world heritage cities has to do with the economic inequality and disconnection between the historic centre and the rest of the city areas. This causes a scarce distribution of the benefits of tourism and scarce options for development, employment and welfare. Therefore, this activity focuses on connecting the historic centre with the municipal territory, thus expanding its tourist area through ecotourism and culture. To this end, actions will be carried out on: 1) Design of an ecotourism and cultural strategy. 2) Promotion of routes and paths that pass through the historic centre and other areas of the municipal territory. 3) Celebration of a rural fair promoting local products. 4) Celebration of local parties outside the historic centre.

Plan to improve exports of local products from heritage cities through an e-commerce platform

• All the world heritage cities of the CITY 2020 Network will be integrated into an online platform for online commerce. The list of world heritage cities will be included in this platform and, within each of them, local businesses and potential products to be exported will be incorporated. A course of management of the platform will be taught to the merchants incorporated, so that they can receive the orders online and manage them accordingly. The single platform will be managed from a central / company, which will provide technical support to all the businesses in all the cities involved.

Programme for the promotion of social entrepreneurship

• This program tries to support social entrepreneurs; in other words, those people who contribute to solve a social need through economically and environmentally sustainable projects. The support will consist of advisory actions, exchange of experiences, training, support in the design of the final project and presentation before a panel of experts in the field of social entrepreneurship. The aim is to provide entrepreneurs the skills, tools and a solid and professional project they can present at local, regional, national and international level.